FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT PERKASIE - PAGE 3

Perkasie residents will pay $35 per year to help cover the costs of the borough's trash collection program. Council unanimously approved the flat fee to help deal with a budget crunch, according to a press release from the borough. The fee will be levied on all residential properties based on the number of electric meters on the building. The method of collecting the fee and the billing date has not yet been determined. Council also approved other changes for trash collection.

Perkasie has signed a two-year contract with its public works and electric department, and a memorandum of understanding with its police department. The public works and electric contract freezes salaries through 2012. "They have agreed to zero percent increases over the next two years, with year-end bonuses of 1 percent in 2011, and 1.5 percent in 2012," Perkasie Borough Manager Dan Olpere said last week. Olpere said the agreement with members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees was both realistic and recognized current economic conditions.

Police in Wheeling, W.Va., are investigating the beating death of a college student from Perkasie, who was assaulted Saturday and died from his injuries Sunday. Kevin Figaniak, 21, was a star hockey and lacrosse player from Pennridge High School and was in his senior year at Wheeling Jesuit University. He and another student, whom police have not identified, were attacked by four men about a mile from campus around 1:45 a.m. Saturday, police said. Figaniak was rushed to Wheeling Hospital with "significant head trauma" and later transferred to UPMC Presbyterian Hospital in Pittsburgh, where he was pronounced dead at 3:05 a.m. Sunday, according to the Allegheny County medical examiner's office.

A $117,500 state Growing Greener grant is putting money into the banks of the East Branch of the Perkiomen Creek in Lenape Park in Perkasie. Perkasie will begin the process to shore up the creek banks after a two-year process devoted to finding funding. "We applied for this grant in 2009, but didn't receive it. Now we have the funding to get things done," said Andrea Coaxum, assistant borough manager. Coaxum said getting rejected the first time for the funding was a mixed blessing.

A Perkasie man was injured early Tuesday when his car went off an East Rockhill Township road and hit several trees, police said. Christian T. Sterling, 22, was driving too fast for conditions, state police at Dublin said. Sterling was eastbound on Three Mile Run near W. Rock Road at 1:10 a.m. when the car went off the right side of the road at a curve, state police at Dublin said. The front tires caught a ditch, spinning the rear of the car into the trees, police said. Police cited Sterling for allegedly driving at an unsafe speed and careless driving.

A Pennridge Regional police officer was hit by a vehicle and three civilians were hurt on Route 309 near Perkasie on Thursday night as the officers investigated an earlier accident, authorities said. Officer Pedro Ruiz was hit about 7:40 p.m. at southbound Route 309 in West Rockhill Township, just south of the Lawn Avenue exit. His knees were injured as a patrol car was knocked into him, police said. Ruiz and a second Pennridge officer went to the scene about 10 minutes earlier after a large mobile home fell off its rear axle and a minivan ran into the debris, according to police radio reports.